Latest / Voices for Voices® / Panic at 100 Feet: Why We Need to Talk About Mental Health | Ep 277
Transcript
- 0:00Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Hey everyone, welcome to another episode of the Voices for Voices TV show and podcast.
- 0:05Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I'm your host, founder and executive director of Voices for Voices, Justin Alan Hayes.
- 0:11Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Thank you so much for joining us, whether this is your first episode or you've been with us the whole way.
- 0:17Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We just want to thank you for supporting being a part of Voices for Voices and, if you're able to give us a subscribe, a thumbs up and share this show, this podcast, with your networks, we'd greatly appreciate it.
- 0:36Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I have a huge goal, as those who have been with us from the beginning already know, of wanting to help 3 billion people over the course of my lifetime and beyond.
- 0:44Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Those who have been with us from the beginning already know of helping, wanting to help 3 billion people over the course of my lifetime and beyond through Voices for Voices, the nonprofit organization that has this show.
- 0:57Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And thank you again.
- 0:59Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Here in the United States and across the world, it's really humbling to think that we're touching so many people's lives, both here in Northeast Ohio, hudson area, western Reserve, united States as a whole, and then over 50 countries outside of the United States.
- 1:24Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So it's incredible and we don't take it lightly that we're coming into your living rooms, your dorms, your offices, your earbuds, on an airplane, on a subway train, what have you?
- 1:46Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We just thank you that you would take any time out of any of your days to join us.
- 1:55Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So thank you again.
- 1:58Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We're going to be talking about anxiety, which we've talked about multiple times, but we're going to talk about anxiety and how that can lead to potential life-threatening situations, and so we'll just jump right in Recently.
- 2:24Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So when this airs, when you're first watching and listening to this, this story will be a month or a month and a half old.
- 2:33Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But I'll just ask you know, how do you react?
- 2:40Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: How does your body react when you're in a stressful, anxious situation?
- 2:45Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I know, for me there seems to be always a stressful situation that makes me anxious, and for me, there's just a multitude of ways that as far as how I work through that, and two of those ways one is therapy, another is medication, and you know we're not advocating one way or another for medication.
- 3:18Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I'm speaking about me personally and my experience about me personally and my experience as well as through past therapy, past group therapy sessions that I've been a part of Something as simple as just saying you know, I'm safe, I'm okay and this instant I'm safe and I'm okay.
- 3:44Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We don instant.
- 3:44Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I'm safe and I'm okay.
- 3:45Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We don't know what the next instant or the next minute, the next hour, next day is going to bring us.
- 3:54Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But that's one of the things I took from one of our group therapy sessions that I was in in 2017 and 2018, and in a group setting as well.
- 4:08Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: As you know, there's you know, adult coloring books.
- 4:11Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: There's.
- 4:12Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: There's a multitude of ways, and what I would say is just find what works for you.
- 4:20Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: What works for me probably isn't what works for you.
- 4:23Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Maybe a part of it is and a part of it isn't.
- 4:27Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Because I had to.
- 4:28Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I had to find that out because I I couldn't sit around a table of 10 other individuals talking about my mental health and how things were going for me and think that, oh well, this is working for them or this isn't working for them, so I'm not even going to try it because it's not working for them, and so I didn't want to project myself and my thoughts on another individual's thoughts and how they were handling the situation.
- 5:03Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I look at it much like when you have a big decision to make you want to have as much information as possible.
- 5:12Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So, say, if you're looking to buy a house, you want to have as much information about the neighborhood, the safety, any other homes that were sold in the area, what they sold for when were they sold, what school district and the like.
- 5:32Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so you're gathering a lot of information and some of it you and I would look at more than others, that we would put more weight to it.
- 5:44Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And those are the things for therapy, for anxiety and really anything that you're talking about, and I'm talking about my situation, my experiences.
- 5:56Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: If it's an individual session and then my therapist is giving feedback, if it's a group setting, then there are going to be others that are in in that therapy with you and we're each going to have an opportunity to you know, share and and speak, and so there's going to be a lot of information, a lot of things that others have and are going through that I'm not or I haven't, and I have to remember that.
- 6:31Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: It's about that information gathering of like oh well, maybe I'll try this or maybe I'll try that.
- 6:38Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So we want to think of things kind of in that sense of is anything working now when you're in an anxious or a stressful environment?
- 6:50Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And then are there other ways.
- 6:54Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I mean we can obviously head to our phones or our laptops or iPads and we can obviously do a search and find some things that others are doing and have done, but again, we just want to take those with a grain of salt because we don't want to automatically jump into.
- 7:23Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Oh well, this person is getting through their anxiety by doing this and that and the other, and that's really helpful to again just gather as much information and find out what works for you.
- 7:43Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: The other thing is we don't know how others are going to react in those stressful situations, whether we think of it as maybe something more special, or maybe traveling.
- 7:57Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: If we've never flown on an airplane before and the destination we're going to we have to fly on an airplane, how are we going to work through that?
- 8:20Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so those are the things that you want to think about.
- 8:25Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So we're going to transition from the stress, anxiety, fear, panic, panic, attack to actual situations, and so the story that I referred to at the beginning is what I want to talk about now is in Montenegro, is what I want to talk about now is in Montenegro, which is another area, another country where people go to visit for vacation, and, if anybody's been around an ocean.
- 9:01Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: There are different activities that you're able to partake in, whether that's just hanging out, having a cabana to block some of the sun out and reading a book, listening to music, just listening to the waves, just taking things in.
- 9:20Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Or there's also, you know, you could jet ski or parasail, and then the parasail is, you know they?
- 9:29Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Basically you're connected with a harness that's connected to a parachute on a boat and the boat goes, and then you and if you're by yourself or if you're doing tandem, go up into the air, maybe 100 feet, whatever that tops out at, and you go through that, and so that's something that is available.
- 10:01Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so in Montenegro there is a story and it's very, it's heartbreaking where there was a young lady that went parasailing, read and heard in the news stories.
- 10:31Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Once she got her harness and everything connected, it was her turn, Because usually you're on a boat with maybe like I don't know four or five or six others, and so you know you take the turn.
- 10:44Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So it's like, okay, well, we'll go first, we'll go second.
- 10:48Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so when it got to be her turn and she got into the harness, she started to have a panic attack.
- 10:54Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: She started to like freak out, and, and so the boat started going.
- 11:02Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: She started going up into the air with the parachute, again connecting to the harness, for safety precautions, obviously.
- 11:12Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And at a particular moment she was many feet above the water and she started having a panic attack.
- 11:25Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so we say, well, I would handle it this way and I would handle it that way, and why would somebody do this?
- 11:31Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Well, what ended up happening was she ended up having a panic attack and started to unbuckle the harness that was to keep her safe, to keep her connected to the parachute.
- 11:45Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so she did.
- 11:49Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: She disconnected the harness and she was removed from the harness, removed from the parachute, and she fell to her death into the water.
- 12:05Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And this is a very, very yeah, it's heartbreaking, really to just think about that.
- 12:17Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so there's, you know, a lot of people out there that are like, well, why would she do that?
- 12:22Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Like, why would, if you're going through stress and the panic attack, why?
- 12:26Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Why would you try to get yourself out of something that is meant to help save you and help keep you safe?
- 12:34Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And that's where I go back to.
- 12:36Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We're all human beings, we all react different in different situations.
- 12:40Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So we don't know what was going on in her mind.
- 12:48Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But what ended up happening was she did have a panic attack because, as the boat was getting started and she was connected, she was allegedly and again, we're not theirs, we don't have boots-on-the-ground coverage but what has been reported in some news outlets is that once she got connected and then the boat started going and then the parachute started doing its thing and inflating and that she was, you know, like you know, get me out of this, get me out of this or something to that, that effect, and and that, like you know, one of the worst times to to have a not just to have a panic attack, because I, I, I parasailed with with my wife and it was scary.
- 13:44Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: It was like, oh yeah, this is cool, like I can't wait to do this.
- 13:49Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And then, when I did it and you're going up and then there's this, at least for me, there was just that moment like okay, like I'm still buckled in, we're still connected my now wife, because it was years before we were married, we did this, and so then I was able to enjoy, you know, the few minutes that we were at kind of the max height of the parasail and I know I was stressed and it was one of those things where I just thought like, okay, well, the boats gonna start going and we're gonna start going up, like there's no getting around it.
- 14:32Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: That's what.
- 14:33Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: That's what this is, and so that's an instance that I can relate to a little bit of having some some stress around that activity.
- 14:45Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so, unfortunately, this young lady passed away, and was she going to therapy?
- 14:54Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We don't know and that's not really for us to really judge.
- 14:59Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We're just sharing this information, sharing this story because it has garnered national and international attention, and it gives us another reason to keep stressing, which is how our organization, voices for Voices, was founded Around mental health, trauma, addiction, recovery, those types of areas.
- 15:25Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So this gives us another way of saying okay, if I'm in that situation, or maybe I know somebody, let me reach out.
- 15:37Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so we'd say who do we reach out to?
- 15:40Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We're going to, we can reach out today or any day here in the United States, and so that's where country to country, city to city, township, province are going to have their own protocols, but here in the United States I can say that there is help available if you or somebody you know is going through a crisis, and that is the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline that's available 24 hours a day, also in English and Spanish, and what you can do is you can either call 988, you can text 988, you can chat on their website, which is 988lifelineorg.
- 16:32Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And we know that life's challenges are definitely some are harder than others and we just want to have a way to help, if we're able to, and so to know that that's available here in the United States, which that's recent, the last couple of years, that this has become kind of a federal, so like all in the United States is covered versus one town, one city, one township, and so we hope that more countries adopt a policy that's similar to at least have that lifeline out there.
- 17:21Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We can't control whether somebody uses the lifeline or whether they don't, but we can have the resources and resource available that, if somebody, again, it's much easier.
- 17:37Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I've found when you're kind of like behind your phone that you're not like face-to-face, you know with somebody and speaking and you know you're talking about, you know very sensitive topics and experiences, and so that's why this 988 Lifeline is so ingenious, because it gives so many ways and really all of them except I mean maybe the chat, maybe do kind of like a FaceTime thing or a Zoom where you see them and they see you, but texting or calling you're able to, in a way, remain anonymous and so you don't have to tell friends, family, others, friends, family, others.
- 18:25Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We, just as a human race, we just want to see people that are going through tough situations, because we all do and we handle again that stress and anxiety and that panic and panic attacks.
- 18:38Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Some of us have them, some of us don't, some have them driving, some have them, like I mentioned in a prior episode, in a conference room or in a meeting, whether you have a speaking part or whether you're just there to take notes, that there's just so many.
- 18:56Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Let's just say life's not easy Growing up.
- 19:00Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I wish that I would have learned a lot more about the mental side of stress and anxiety and fear and panic, of how to manage that in those situations.
- 19:16Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Life or really just any job, life where sometimes restructurings you know there's not enough money for a particular project and so the project may not be able to continue, and so if there's three people working on that project, maybe those three people are unfortunately going to lose their job, and so that's going to create a lot of panic and trauma and that, oh my gosh, like it's a huge, it's a, it's a milestone, a major milestone in our lives, like being born, being married, having a, having a child or children, being baptized or certain life events that that happen.
- 20:01Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And you know, getting that job offer and accepting it is one of those.
- 20:08Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: That's in that positive light.
- 20:10Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But then we also have to think of the flip side.
- 20:12Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: As we know, everything's not rosy and sunny and unicorns out there.
- 20:22Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: There is from time to time, and some individuals, more than others, seem to go through tough time after tough time after tough time, and it's just and it's not a bad thing.
- 20:40Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Don't feel ashamed to ask for help.
- 20:43Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: This young lady that passed away in Montenegro on vacation that was her conference room really for me.
- 20:54Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So me being in the Corps of America, or even having our shows and our podcasts, I still get nervous and I'm anxious and I say like a lot I say and a lot, and I stutter sometimes.
- 21:09Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But it's authentic, it's who we are as human beings and I wouldn't want it any other way.
- 21:17Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so an individual who is on vacation and decides to do the parasailing we, we don't know how that person felt.
- 21:30Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We don't know what led up to that we don't know that there was trauma she was dealing with from the past or or recently.
- 21:38Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We just, we just don't know, was she bullied?
- 21:43Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Because we know that is a big, big, big problem, especially with, as we know, with social media, of looking at videos and photos and saying, oh my gosh, these people, they're always at the beach, they're always doing all these great things and how, how's their face, you know, so clear and their body, they so, I'm saying so close to perfect.
- 22:09Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: It's like, uh, you know, we start to judge ourselves against something that is not really realistic because, uh, you know, from from our position, from my position, you know, nobody's perfect, god's perfect, god's perfect, and we're all going to have things that we're going to do well at, we're going to have things we're going to fail at.
- 22:31Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And really, to harken back to an early episode with Jason Simpson, we had kind of in the entertainment industry, actor, voiceover actor, regular physical actor he talked about, talked about that himself've made mistakes, and so he was looking at those situations of how they, how does you know, like a, an a-lister, making millions and millions, and you know in all this, what we would think, I like, oh well, they're getting, they have the life, they're able to do whatever they want with the money and that.
- 23:28Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But he's watched people at the top of their game make mistakes and he's seen how they in his industry, how they react with that, and so that's the same thing really here that we're going to be in situations and we're going to.
- 23:44Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We're going to make mistakes.
- 23:45Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We make mistakes every day.
- 23:48Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Uh, just on on the way to the studio I got some gas and, you know, did the card, uh the tap, and picked the theaded, opened up the gas cap, the door and then the gas cap on my car, and then, as I took the, let's say, the gas filler off of the place it hangs See, I'm at a loss of words right now, it's funny.
- 24:17Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But anyways, I took it off to go to put it into the gas tank to be filled up, and so I picked it up and the handle wasn't pulled, but there was a decent amount of gas liquid that just spewed out of the gas handle thing.
- 24:43Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And so here I am, coming to the studio to film some of our shows and the last thing I wanted is to spill something that's going to be noticeable, and even at that there's going to be wrinkles on clothes, no matter what it's, it's just the way it is.
- 25:06Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: There's a wrinkle on my uh t-shirt, uh and jacket and it's just who we are, and so that that gas situation, so that happened.
- 25:15Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Luckily I was able to step back and not get any on me, uh, because, uh, I I'd be smelling like gasoline and nobody wants that.
- 25:25Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So anyways, I didn't really have control over it.
- 25:31Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Somehow the mechanism had a little bit of gas left in it that when the next person, which was me, went and went to fill up my gas tank, that some of it came out and there was nothing I can do about it.
- 25:50Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I couldn't have really prepared any better.
- 25:54Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I mean, I did take a little bit of a step back, but I think I did that more because I, I was going to the studio, coming here to the studio, and so that probably helped out a little bit.
- 26:06Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But anyways, there's going to be stuff.
- 26:08Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We're going to be opening the cupboard to maybe get cereal out and something else is going to fall and hit the floor and maybe spill, and you got to pick.
- 26:18Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Things like that just just happen, and and so for me, I, I just have to go.
- 26:24Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Well, you know I, you know I, I can't help it, I there's nothing I can do.
- 26:30Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I mean, I could go in for the gas situation.
- 26:33Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: I could go in and talk to the attendant and say, hey, this happened to me and it might not happen ever again at that pump, at that particular gas station.
- 26:43Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So we just kind of go with the flow and try to, as much as possible, try to minimize some of those things that might not go our way and to go after those things that we feel passionate about.
- 27:00Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Again, I go back to one of our shows with Jason and he said that he wasn't good at anything.
- 27:07Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: He knew he wanted to go into film.
- 27:09Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: He didn't know what that looked like when he was growing up, but from an age of 10, watching Transformers, that was something that he knew that he wanted to do.
- 27:19Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Didn't know how it was gonna happen, but he had that passion, he had the dream to do it and that's something that he knew that he wanted to do.
- 27:24Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Didn't know how it was going to happen, but he had that passion, he had the dream to do it.
- 27:25Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And that's something that we want.
- 27:25Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We want you and everybody who is touched by Voices for Voices to dream, go after your dreams and do what you're passionate about.
- 27:37Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We only have one life here on Earth and and so that that's been helpful for me with our organization is just because I'm just so passionate about you know, the mental health and the trauma and recovery and and all those things.
- 27:54Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: That is it work to put on shows and to without a teleprompter and that.
- 28:00Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: But it's just how I am.
- 28:02Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: It's like I, like I've grown where a lot of episodes end, so I've just I guess I've just learned as I've gone.
- 28:09Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: Sometimes the intro is one way, sometimes it's another, sometimes the outro is one way, sometimes it's the other.
- 28:17Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: It doesn't matter.
- 28:18Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: What matters is we want to be a voice and a place for you to share your voice, and if you would like to share your voice and be a guest on our show, definitely reach out, comment.
- 28:32Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: We would be happy to have a conversation and help share your voice and help inspire others, and that's what we're here for.
- 28:40Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: And help inspire others, and that's what we're here for.
- 28:42Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So rest in peace.
- 28:43Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: The young lady who passed away, montenegro, who just had a panic attack at not a good time.
- 28:53Voices for VoicesⓇ, Justin Alan Hayes: So until next time, please be a voice for you or somebody in need.